The increased capacity of digital memory storage, both locally on a computer and remotely over networks, such as the internet, to remote electronic data storage, offers users access to large amounts of data in a very convenient form and physical size. Data may be available on diskette, CD-ROM, magnetic tape, and online to a centrally located computer/server and memory storage medium. The challenge remains to extract information from the data simply and efficiently, and to have confidence that all relevant items have been uncovered. The widespread use of computers and electronic searching has attracted the attention of large manufacturers offering a vast array of products in an increasingly competitive environment. In an effort to offer products that closely matches customer needs, manufacturers proliferate product and product feature alternatives, and create different product model numbers or part numbers for these alternative products. This proliferation of product offerings provides the customer with more options from which to choose, however, it also increases the difficulty of finding a product that matches a specific customer's needs.
Computer implemented searching of a database of part numbers, model numbers, etc. stored in a digital memory, to determine if there is a match with a part number of interest, is difficult when the part numbers are stored in a format that is different from the part number the user is searching for, which is often the case. There can be any number of reasons for this discrepancy, including but not limited to the following examples:    1. A manufacturer uses the number 12345 for a part number, and 12345R for the refurbished version of the part number. If the user enters the query part number 12345 and the only stored part number is 12345R, there will be no match. The user, however, might be satisfied with the refurbished version 12345R.    2. A manufacturer uses 12345 for a part number, and 12345W for a version of the part number that is white. If the stored part number is 12345 and the user enters 12345W there will be no match.    3. An equipment manufacturer uses part number 12345 of a component manufacturer in particular equipment, and sells this part as a spare part under the number AB12345, where AB represents the abbreviation of the equipment manufacturer name or the component manufacturer's name. If the user enters AB12345 and the stored part number is 12345 there will be no match.    4. The manufacturer B of a component that is equivalent in form/fit/function to the component number 12345 made by manufacturer A might give the equivalent part number the code 12345B.    5. The distributor of the part 12345 made by manufacturer A might assign the part number DS12345 to the part.    6. Sometimes, a distributor of a part adds a couple of digits before or after the part number. For example, part number 12345 might be stored as 9012345 or 1234590.
In one embodiment, what is needed is a search method and system that enables stored part numbers in a database to be retrieved even though the stored part number is not exactly the same as the query part number provided by a user, and wherein the retrieved stored part number or numbers are sorted by various criteria so that it is more likely that the most relevant stored part number or numbers are displayed to the user in a descending order of relevance.